What better day to start this story than Mother’s Day? This is a day when we are supposed to shower our mothers with love and affection, thanking them for all they have done for us. But what about those of us whose feelings for our mothers don’t exactly add up to love, affection, or gratitude? For those of us who are mothers ourselves, this day is a double-edged sword. We may be surrounded by our loving children, who bring us breakfast in bed and make handmade cards. And we feel a love for them that is so deep that it fills us up.
But still, somewhere in the depths of our soul, there is that empty feeling that was left there by our own mothers who just couldn’t give the love, nurturing, and affection that we needed. For those of us who have recognized her for what she is and understand where the pain comes from, we strive to live our lives authentically, which begs the question, how do we deal with Mother’s Day with our own mothers?
I woke up this morning with mixed emotions. I was excited about the breakfast-in-bed that my daughter had planned and looking forward to spending the day with my kids and husband. But in the back of my mind, I knew that I would have to call her today. Conversations with her often don’t end well, and it’s really a crap shoot as to what mood I’ll find her in. Will she be in a good mood, or will the accusations and guilt-trips fly? Will she say something hurtful about my dad?
Last year, I did not call my mother for Mother’s Day. We had had a falling out several weeks before (she has several, um, strange personality traits, which I’ll get to later) and I had told her that I would not be speaking to her until she fixed a problem that she had caused. This may sound harsh, but ultimatums are the only way to get her to do something she doesn’t want to do. Of course, she did not fix the problem.
Maybe I should have called, but I used the situation to excuse myself from something I hated doing: wishing her a happy Mother’s Day. It just feels so disingenuous to call her up and pretend that I’m grateful for “all the things” she did for me. That’s not to say that she didn’t do some things for which I am grateful, it’s just that I am now aware that nothing she did was really in my interest, only hers. The farther I get into motherhood, the more I appalled by, and the less I understand her behavior. But I know that she really can’t help how she is. I’m sure that there is a lot of pain in her past that she has never talked about.
So, today, I will be calling her to wish her a happy Mother’s Day. No more, no less.
I know there are other un-mothered mothers out there who feel the pain of growing up with a mother who was too self-absorbed to see them for who they were and are. It’s OK to feel this way about Mother’s Day. It’s also OK to be secretly envious of those who have the type of mother we wished we had had growing up or wish we had now. I know, and I see you.
It’s OK if you don’t want to call or see your mother today.
It’s OK if you do call or see her and give her a half-hearted “Happy Mother’s Day” but still feel yucky about it.
It’s OK to stop pretending that everything is OK.
Everything is not OK, and that’s OK.